This invention relates to surgical instrument jaw covers, and in particular haemostat shods.
Haemostats are used in surgery for gripping or clamping blood vessels and also for grasping sutures. The jaws of haemostats are serrated and these serrations can result in damage to sutures. To reduce the risk of damage small rubber or plastic covers have been developed for covering the tips of each jaw of a haemostat. Such covers are known as xe2x80x9cshodsxe2x80x9d or suture boots.
Available shods are produced singly although generally sold in sets of pairs of separate shods. A pair of shods are used once only and then discarded.
To enable single shods to be used effectively they generally must be presented in a way providing for convenient engagement of a pair of separate shods over each jaw tip simultaneously. This can require bulky or complex packaging.
A further problem associated with the use of haemostats for tying sutures is the risk of the suture becoming engaged or entangled in the hinge of the haemostat.
A further problem arises from the fact that existing shods cover only a part of the haemostat xe2x80x9cteethxe2x80x9d. Thus, there is only a small area of the haemostat jaws that can be used to grip a suture, and a surgeon must be careful to line up the suture with the shod surface to avoid damaging the suture.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,834,090 discloses a form of disposable suture boot which comprises a sealed elongate monolithic unitary hollow cylindrical body of resilient surgical rubber. The cylindrical body is cut at a mid-point to form an interconnecting web between the sealed tube ends which form the suture boots. For these suture boots to work the material they are made from must be of sufficient resilience to allow the jaws of the surgical instrument to open. However, the interconnecting web still needs to stretch, and this will interfere with the ordinary operation of the instrument. There is also a potential problem of this web snapping whilst the device is being engaged on a surgical instrument or during operation of the instrument, with the added problem of sutures then becoming trapped on the surgical instrument. Further, the close proximity of the open ends of the tube, and the fact that the tube must be physically folded into a V-shape by the user before it can be engaged on the jaws, makes engagement on the jaw tips difficult.
In addition, with the suture boots being formed from a unitary hollow tube, ie, with parallel sides, there can be difficulties associated with fully engaging the boots onto generally tapered jaws of surgical instruments.
Thus, it is an object of the present invention to provide surgical instrument jaw covers which reduce or overcome at least some of the above mentioned problems, or which at least provides the public with a useful alternative. In particular, it is an object of the invention to provide instrument jaw covers which are easier and/or more convenient to engage on a surgical instrument, and/or which better protect sutures from damage by the instrument without interfering with effective operation of the instrument.
Other objects of the invention may become apparent from the following description which is given by way of example only.
According to one aspect of the present invention there is provided surgical instrument jaw covers including a pair of spaced-apart shods interconnected by a bridging member, each shod having an opening to a bore adapted to accommodate a tip of a jaw of a surgical instrument and the bridging member defining a separation distance between the openings.
Preferably, the bridging member may be integrally formed with the shods.
Preferably, a mid-portion of the bridging member, between the openings of the shods, may be wider than portions adjacent the shods.
Preferably, the separation distance may be in the range 5-15 mm.
Preferably, the separation distance may be substantially 10 mm.
Preferably, each bore may be tapered, wider at the opening than at the opposite, closed, longitudinal end.
Other aspects of the present invention may become apparent from the following description which is given by way of example and with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: